


Breuddwydion aderyn y to

by Doranwen



Category: Dark Is Rising Sequence - Susan Cooper
Genre: Gen, Memory Alteration, Memory Fix-It, remembering
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-12-16
Updated: 2016-12-16
Packaged: 2018-09-08 23:11:05
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,092
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8867074
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Doranwen/pseuds/Doranwen
Summary: It was as if a door had opened in her mind, a door she had forgotten even existed.





	

**Author's Note:**

  * For [smolder](https://archiveofourown.org/users/smolder/gifts).



> I spotted your prompts on the PH post and wrote the fic before I noticed you'd deleted them! I hope you enjoy the fic anyway. :)
> 
> Thank you to greenlily for helping with brainstorming, and to thedevilchicken for assistance with one detail.

_"Give us the manuscript," said the man standing in the dinghy. His hair lifted in a slight breeze, and his eyes were menacing. "Give it to us and we will take you off safely."_

_Her eyes took in the sea, the tide coming in with each splash of the waves, and the tall man in black ready to leap from the dinghy onto the rocks. Her brothers stood beside her defiantly._

_The sea lifted the dinghy up—_

The sound of the alarm woke Jane. What a strange dream! It felt so real, as if she could still smell the sea and hear the splash of the water against the shore.

She fumbled to turn the alarm off, then climbed out of bed and began to dress in the chilly air. She hadn't dreamed of the sea for **ages**. The last time had to be during the summer holidays a couple years ago, when they were in Cornwall. They'd had all sorts of fun adventures, exploring the coast. But why she would have dreamed of being trapped, and Mr. Withers and Mr. Hastings threatening them… She paused, arms partway through the sleeves of her school blazer. _Where did those names come from?_ She didn't remember meeting either man. Yet she somehow **knew** those names were correct. Something inside her recognized them and acknowledged them, deeper than conscious memory.

She shook her head to dispel the confusion and finished dressing. She hurried downstairs for breakfast, trying to put the odd sense of memory behind her. Whoever Mr. Withers and Mr. Hastings were, remembering them wasn't going to be of any use that day.

* * *

_She stared at a great image formed of hazel, rowan, and hawthorn. Power and loneliness emanated from it in one giant wave, nearly overwhelming her. She walked close and laid a hand on one bough. "Oh dear, I wish you could be happy," she said, a response to the intense melancholy that cloaked the silent figure._

_The dream changed, and suddenly Jane was in shadows, with an unhappy voice echoing around her. "My secret is important to you?"_

_"Of course it is," she heard herself say._

_"Then here," said the voice. "Take it."_

She woke with the scent of the sea in her nostrils, and she could almost feel her hands clutching a misshapen lead case. She tried to remember what was in the case, but could not. The Greenwitch had given it to her, though, she did know that.

At that thought Jane wrinkled her forehead in puzzlement. The Greenwitch? One part of her brain seemed to say she had no idea what or who that was. The other part of her gradually began to remember the long cold night, the women humming as they wove, the image taking shape. How had she not remembered it before? Yet she hadn't, for certain. It was as if a door had opened in her mind, a door she had forgotten even existed.

She rose and began to dress, but the Greenwitch's squat, terrible, lonely form arose unbidden in her mind many times, and she wondered about it.

* * *

_"Good-bye now, my five companions," Great-Uncle Merry told them. "Be proud of yourselves, as I am proud of you."_

_She hugged him, a quick short hug that left her eyes moist, then watched him climb to the top of the mountain. His face was profiled against the sky, and the wind played at his hair. An arm raised to salute them, then stiffened slightly as he spread his fingers wide to point at them—_

Jane blinked as her mind roused from sleep. What a lot of strange dreams she had been having. And about things so long ago. Why, it had been months since they last saw Gumerry, as she remembered calling him. And she didn't remember ever saying any formal goodbye; he was always in and out of their lives anyway.

But something inside her knew that the scene on the mountain was very real. Gumerry—Great-Uncle Merry—had been proud of them over something. Over what? And companions? How could they, mere children, be called companions, as if they had done something great together with him, with Merriman Lyon?

She startled at the recognition of the name. Yes, that was his name. Vaguely, in the back of her head, she remembered Barney slurring it together. _"Merlin."_ One part of her scoffed at the idea, the other latched onto it tightly. And the five fingers… His voice suddenly came back to her. _"You will never again know any hint of it except in dreams,"_ it said in her mind. He had done something, something with his fingers, and that's why she couldn't remember more, hadn't he? It sounded silly when she said it to herself but she couldn't dismiss the possibility. In her mind she saw strange sights—a tree in summer, and mistletoe?—and shook her head in bewilderment. It was all becoming a muddle—the more she remembered, the more confused she was. At this point, she had more questions than answers.

* * *

"You can see by the workmanship of this tool that—"

Jane tuned out the tour guide as she followed her classmates through the museum. Barney would have liked this field trip; he found old artefacts fascinating, particularly if he could imagine they were about King Arthur.

The tour guide stopped in front of a display case containing a greenish-colored metal ring that looked a little like a collar. "This here is a copper torc of Celtic workmanship; it was found at Tintagel Castle. It is uncertain exactly when this piece was made, but…"

The guide's voice, along with all the other noise of her class, faded in Jane's ears as she stared at the torc. Etched into the copper was a particular symbol: a circle quartered by a cross. She had seen this symbol before. As she gazed at it, the world seemed to transform around her, and she was plunged into an unfamiliar memory.

 _Will shouted, "_ Six Signs shall burn! _Take one for each, and circle the tree!"_

_She reached towards a chain of links and found herself clutching a symbol made of bronze. She stood in front of the tree and thrust it out towards the terrible Riders galloping down from the clouds at them. John Rowlands took one of the Signs from Bran; Bran reached up with his sword to cut the blossom, which Merriman tossed into the air… and which became a white bird that flew away. The Sign in her hand blazed with a cold light and vanished._

"Jane?" a voice called.

Jane looked up, blinking a little.

Her teacher was looking at her. "Are you all right? You looked lost in thought."

Jane pasted a smile on her face. "Yes, I'm fine. Sorry, ma'am." She hurried to rejoin the class, but her mind was spinning. She **remembered** it all now… the Signs, the Dark and the Light, Merriman Lyon and Will as Old Ones, Bran as King Arthur's son… and that fateful moment when dear Great-Uncle Merry had pointed his fingers at them and made them forget everything. She could not blame him entirely; he had done what he thought best for them. But there she thought him quite mistaken. After all, was it not when people knew the great, high things that happened in the past, that they lived even better in the present? Ignorant people more easily became small-minded; remembering was what helped one to be wise.

But was she the only one to remember? Will, she knew, would not have forgotten. He was an Old One; that finger trick probably didn't work on him, and Merriman probably didn't want him to forget. But Bran or her brothers? Had they had the same strange dreams? There was only one way to find out.

* * *

"Barney, have you had any strange dreams lately?" Jane asked her younger brother from the doorway to his room.

Barney frowned slightly. "I dreamed I was in a funny caravan and talking to a man who was a painter. And the other day I dreamed Gumerry's real name was Merlin." He looked straight at Jane. "It's funny; I feel like somehow that's true, even though it doesn't make sense."

Jane smiled. "I know what you mean."

* * *

_Dear Bran,_

_I hope you are well. I'm writing because I wondered if it would be all right for my brothers and I to visit you this summer. My parents are planning on taking a long holiday to America and asked if we would like to go along, or if we would rather stay behind. I remembered how much we enjoyed the holiday in Wales with you and Will._

_Please let me know what your father says._

_Sincerely,  
Jane Drew_

_P.S. I have had some unusual dreams about our adventures last summer. I wonder if you have too?_

* * *

Convincing her parents to let them go visit Wales again was the easiest part. Convincing Simon and Barney was a little trickier, but she managed it with much pleading and cajoling. The letter from Bran's father confirming their travel plans was a relief. Now, the last step was to write one more letter. She picked up her pen and began.

* * *

The four children climbed the mountain, step by step, picking their way through springy grass, bracken and gorse, and outcrops of slate. "A lot of work, this is," Simon complained in between steps.

"It's not that bad," Barney said. "Why are we climbing this one, anyway?"

Bran said nothing. He seemed not to hear the other boys, looking around him as if he saw another world.

"We're almost there, then I'll tell you," answered Jane.

When they reached the top, Simon flopped onto the ground with a sigh. Barney soon followed suit. Bran joined the nascent circle, seating himself cross-legged.

Jane sank to her knees in the grass and looked around slowly at the others. "Do you remember this mountain?"

"Didn't we climb it **last** summer?" Simon asked, puzzled.

"Yes."

"Is this—" Barney began, wrinkling his forehead, "—is this where we said goodbye to Gumerry? I mean," he added with a look at Bran, "to Great-Uncle Merry. Merriman Lyon."

"Merlin," Bran said, so quietly Jane almost couldn't make out the word. He had been looking at the landscape almost vacantly before, but now his eyes fixed on Jane intently.

Barney froze, and slowly turned to look at Bran. "You remember that too? I thought— I thought I was imagining it."

"You weren't," Jane said. "I dreamed about facing Mr. Withers and Mr. Hastings, on the coast at Trewissick. I dreamed about seeing the Greenwitch. And I dreamed I said goodbye to Great-Uncle Merry here—and that he made all of us forget what we had seen and done. Do you remember?" She searched each of their faces.

Simon was the first to speak. "I remember the painter and the caravan and— and what he made Barney say."

"But it doesn't make sense," Barney said. "All I can remember are weird bits and pieces."

Jane nodded, and reached into her pocket to pull out a carefully folded drawing. "Does this help?" she asked as she opened the flaps and held up the image of a circle quartered by a cross for each one to see. She could tell by the looks on their faces that the memories were starting to come back to them. "I saw the symbol on a torc in a museum, and it was like all the memories came back all at once."

"Why did he make us forget?" asked Barney. "I mean, obviously it didn't work."

"I think—" Bran began, "—I think he thought that if we remembered, we wouldn't be able to go on with life." His eyes were slightly moist.

"I don't think that's true at all," said Simon. "And either way, taking away our memories isn't fair."

"What about Will?" asked Bran.

"What about me?" asked Will, who was suddenly **there** , standing next to Jane.

Simon squinted his eyes at him. "You never forgot, did you?"

"No, I didn't." Will's face was even and blank, a contrast to the scowl on Simon's.

"Welcome, Old One," Jane said, and they broke their gaze and all turned to look at her, "to the first gathering of the Guardians of the Tree. Or something like that." She smiled. "I hope there will be more." She lifted an eyebrow at Will in challenge.

Will's mouth twitched a little. "Yes," he said clearly, "yes." He settled himself between Bran and Jane, and smiled.

**Author's Note:**

> "Breuddwydion aderyn y to" means "sparrow dreams" in Welsh (at least, according to the translation site I tried). Several websites I ran across said the sparrow was a symbol of memory and remembrance in Celtic mythology. Whether that's true or not, it worked for a title. :)


End file.
